This invention relates to chopsticks, and more particularly concerns a device which holds a pair of chopsticks to facilitate their manipulation.
A chopstick is an elongated rigid utensil having a thick upper extremity and tapering to a narrower lowermost extremity. When a pair of the chopsticks are hand-held at their upper extremities, the lowermost extremities may be manipulated to grip food and lift it to the diner's mouth. Because they are essentially two disconnected sticks, a certain degree of skill is required to manipulate the chopsticks properly. For this reason, most people of the Western world have never used chopsticks except on rare occasions as a lark.
In order to make chopsticks more acceptable to those persons not trained from childhood in their use, numerous modifications have been proposed in chopsticks.
The upper portions of chopsticks have been coupled by resilient means such as springs as disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,937,510; D-277,446; 3,323,825; 3,239,262; 3,501,191; 3,637,248; and 4,199,180. Such spring coupling technique helps maintain the chopsticks in coplanar juxtaposition, permitting the lowermost extremities to be brought together by pivotal motion of the sticks about the spring. However, the spring means itself still permits misalignment of the sticks away from coplanarity by rotation about the axis of the spring. To restrain such rotational movement about a coupling spring in tong-like utensils, U.S. Pat. No. 1,723,597 discloses a second coupling affixed between the elongated members above the spring. However, such constructions are costly and not intended as single use disposable utensils. The aforesaid innovations generally limit the versatility of chopsticks because they cannot fulfill the needs of both beginners and experienced users. Furthermore, prior modifications of chopsticks generally alter the natural motion of the chopsticks, and therefore are poorly suited for training individuals in the use of unmodified chopsticks.
lt is accordingly an object of the present invention to provide a holder which will easily engage and disengage a pair of chopsticks.
It is another object of this invention to provide a holder as in the foregoing object which simplifies the manipulation of chopsticks in the gripping and handling of food, and serves as a training aid for the use of unmodified chopsticks.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a holder of the aforesaid nature which causes the chopsticks to be spanned by resilient means and by means to minimize rotation about said resilient means.
It is still another object of this invention to provide a holder of the aforesaid nature amenable to attachment of advertising indicia and amenable to low cost manufacture.
These objects and other objects and advantages of the invention will be apparent from the following description.